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THE GOOD OF IT 




ENTRANCE TO STONE HALL, ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 



HOW IT PAYS TO GIVE HIGHER EDUCATION 
TO NEGROES — BEING SOME ACCOUNT OF 
WHAT GRADUATES OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
ARE DOING FOR THE UPLIFTING OF THEIR 
RACE — BY EDWARD TWICHELL WARE ^ ^ ^ 

1902 



,)0 - ^r\ 



EVERY GOOD TREE 
BRINGETH FORTH 
GOOD FRUIT — DO MEN 
GATHER GRAPES OF 
THORNS OR FIGS OF 
THISTLES ? .^ ,£?,£>■ .£?• 



NEW YORK PUBL. LrlBJt. 



ATLANTA UNIVERSITY GRADUATES* WORK 




STONE HALL AND CAMPUS OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY. 




HILE sitting at breakfast in a 
^JU^ hotel dining room in one of our 
progressive soutliern cities, last 
June, I fell into conversation 
with a stranger who gave evi- 
dence of possessing more than 
ordinary intelligence and a 
good fund of information, ex- 
cept upon one subject. Yet 
upon this particular subject he had most 
decided opinions, and expressed himself 
\Yith great force. We were talking about 
education as a means of alleviating dis- 
tressing social conditions. " And yet," 
said he, "education doesn't always help. 
Take the case of the Negro — when did 
education ever do a Negro any good ? 
Why, do you know three fourths'*bf'*tlte 
Negroes in our prisons are educated." 
" How much education do you suppose 
they have ? " I asked. " They can read and 
write," he answered, " that is about as far 
as the Negro can go in education. What- 



ever else he acquires is purely through the 
faculty of imitation, and the pity of it is 
that he always imitates what is worst." It 
happened that I had recently visited the 
schools and some of the homes of the 
Negroes in that city (they were graduates 
of Atlanta University) and so I asked him 
if he had done the same. " No, I have 
not," he answered, and then challenged 
me again, " but when did you ever see an 
education do a Negro any good ? " 

This man was doubtless expressing his 
honest conviction with reference to the edu- 
cation of the Negroes, and I have related 
the conversation in order to introduce an 
answer to his question. If I state the 
• .question in a slightly different form, it 
' will find many more subscribers. " When 
did Higher Education ever do a Negro any 
good ? " And because I wish to reach a 
larger number of inquirers, I shall answer 
it in this form, and because I wish to make 
the answer convincing, I shall confine it to 



ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 



what I know and have seen of the students 
and graduates of Atlanta University. 

For a record of the occupations of all the 
graduates of this Institution, the reader 
is referred to the table on the twenty-first 
page. Let me call attention, however, to 
this very significant fact : One of the chief 
objects for the founding of Atlanta Uni- 
versity was to supply the much needed 
teachers for Negro schools. Today about 
sixty per cent of the graduates are teaching. 
About seventy-five per cent of the Negro 
teachers of public schools in the city of 
Atlanta are graduates of Atlanta Uni- 
versity. 

Ten per cent of the graduates of the 
College Department are in distinctively 
religious work. The difficulties which 
confront educated men in the ministry 
among the Negroes are peculiarly discour- 
aging. We are often amused by the ac- 
counts of meetings in the churches of the 



Negroes ; the violent and noisy exhorting 
of the preacher, the weird moaning and 
shouting of the congregation, which in the 
time of revival reaches such a pitch of ex- 
citement as to throw the whole congrega- 
tion into confusion. The religion which 
finds this sort of expression is too often 
devoid of practical effect upon the lives of 
the people, and yet this sort of thing is 
what ignorant Negroes demand. " Quench 
not the Spirit," they say, and the ignorant 
preachers, though often unprincipled, can 
better satisfy this demand than those who 
have learned by more genuine experience 
what is the meaning of Christian faith. 
The educated Christian minister does not 
meet the demand of the ignorant people, 
and, when he does succeed in leading them 
to better things, he arouses the antagonism 
of the ignorant ministers, who see in him 
a dangerous rival. Because of these very 
conditions, there is a crying need for an edu- 




MONUMENT TO FIRST PRESIDENT AND FOUNDER OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY, ERECTED BY 
GRADUATES OVER HIS GRAVE ON THE CAMPUS. 



GRADUATES' WORK 




CHURCH IN CHARLESTON, S. C, OF WHICH AN ATLANTA GRADUATE 
OF 1879 IS PASTOR. 



catecl ministry among these people. The 
bUnd leaders have been leading the blind 
too long already. By patience and perse- 
verance and delicate handling of a difficult 
problem, progress is being made, and 
Christian men aie spoiling a picturesque 
feature of Negro religious life by putting 
in its place a genuine worship of God. 

One of the graduates of Atlanta Univer- 
sity of the class of 1876 has been for 
twenty-five years pas- 
tor of a Church in 
Chattanooga, Tenn. 
A few years ago the 
other Negro churches 
of that city united 
with his in a series of 
revival services held 
in his church build- 
ing. He was anxious 
lest the meetings 
should degenerate in- 
to fruitless excite- 
ment. "Still," he 
said, " these people 
know I do not wish 
any such ' carryings- 



on ' in our church." I 
attended the first meet- 
ing of the series and 
though some of the 
speakers certainly tried 
to make the people 
" rise," the service was 
orderly and effective. 
He tells me that he was 
not able to keep the 
desired control in all 
the meetings, but there 
was this advantage, that 
all the people learned 
that they were welcome 
in his church, and he 
was able to combat the 
accusation that because 
he was an educated 
preacher his church was 
no place for the igno- 
rant. This church is now crowded to its 
utmost capacity, and the people are con- 
sidering the erecting of a new edifice at 
the cost of ten thousand dollars. They 
have decided not to build, however, until 
they have all the money in hand. 

The wife of this minister is also a gradu- 
ate of Atlanta University. They have six 
children, the oldest of whom will soon be 
ready to come to Atlanta, They have a 




CHURCH IN NEWNAN, GA., OF WHICH A GRADUATE OF 1894 IS PASTOR. 



ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 




GATE CITY PUBLIC SCHOOL, ATLANTA, OF WHICH A GRADUATE OF 189O 
IS PRINCIPAL. 



pleasant home and are highly respected 
by all who know them. For eleven years 
this colored man served as a member of 
the City Board of Education, being ap- 



pointed to that office by the Mayor and 
Aldermen. 

The largest public school for the Negroes 
in Georgia, is the Gate City School in At- 




PRINCIPAL AND TEACHERS OF GATE CITY SCHOOL, ATLANTA. ALL BUT FOUR OF THE 
FOURTEEN ARE GRADUATES OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY. 



GRADUATES' WORK 



'"^%^ 
















GEORGIA NORMAL AND INDUSTRIAL INSTITUTE, GREENSBORO, GA., ESTABLISHED 
AND CONDUCTED BY A GRADUATE OF 1896. 



lanta. The principal of that school and all 
of the teachers, except four, are graduates 
of Atlanta University, while one of these 
four received most of her training there. 
Over one thousand children attend this 
school, one set coming in the morning 
and the other in the afternoon. The 
rooms are large and airy, the appearance 
of the children for the most part neat and 



tidy, and the discipline good. When I 
visited the school, the principal had the 
gong sounded for fire drill, and in four 
minutes the six hundred children were all 
out of the building and standing in line in 
the yard. The public school system for 
Negroes in the South is dependent for its 
effectiveness upon just such institutions 
as Atlanta University, where teachers can 




TEACHERS AND PUPILS OF GEORGIA NORMAL AND INDUSTRIAL INSTITUTE. 



ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 



be well trained and disciplined for their 
work. 

Last April I had the privilege of attend- 
ing the Southern Educational Conference 
at Athens, Ga., and while there I took oc- 
casion to visit the schools for the Negroes 
in that city, and everywhere I found the 
graduates of Atlanta University. In the 
West Broad Street School, the principal 
is a graduate of the College Department, 
and all the rest of the teachers are gradu- 
ates of the Normal Department. In Knox 
Institute, which is an American Missionary 



among those in small places. A thrifty 
and ambitious farmer of Greensboro, Ga., 
agreed with his wife that their boys should 
have a good education. Two of them grad- 
uated from Atlanta University in 1896. 
One of these brothers is now the principal 
of the Walker Institute in Augusta, Ga., 
a school of the Northern Baptist Church, 
and the other is the founder and principal 
of the Georgia Normal and Industrial Insti- 
tute in Greensboro, Ga. His work started a 
few years ago in a little four- room house, 
but quickly outgrew its accommodations. 




SEWING AND DRESSMAKING AT GEORGIA NORMAL AND INDUSTRIAL 
INSTITUTE. 



Association School, the principal and head 
of Industrial Department are graduates of 
the College Department of Atlanta Univer- 
sity, and all the rest of the teachers are 
graduates of the Normal Department. 
There are only two other schools for the 
Negroes in Athens, and on rhe teaching 
force of each I found Atlanta graduates. 
Such is the contribution of Atlanta Univer- 
sity to the educational work for the Negroes 
in a city seventy miles away. 

Work among the Negroes in the cities, 
though of vital importance, lacks many of 
the crude and interesting features of work 



The young man then set to work, with 
the industrial training he had received in 
Atlanta University, to put up a building 
of larger dimensions in which to house 
his school. Last May I attended his 
graduating exercises. The schoolhouse is 
little more than a great barn, but it belongs 
to the colored people of that community 
and they are proud of it. Principal and 
students work away at the finishing of 
their schoolhouse as they find time and 
money for materials. At commencement 
they were rejoicing in a second floor re- 
cently built, which made place for a chapel 



GRADUATES' WORK 




TEACHERS AND PUPILS OF LAMSON SCHOOL, MARSHALLVILLE, GA. THE PRINCIPAL IS A GRADUATE 
OF 1885 AND THREE OF HER ASSISTANTS ARE ALSO ATLANTA GRADUATES. 




BIBLE TRAINING SCHOOL OF TUSKEGEE INSTITUTE, ALA., WHOSE DEAN (ALSO CHAPLAIN OF THE 
INSTITUTE) IS A GRADUATE OF 1876. SIX OTHER GRADUATES ARE ALSO ASSISTING MR. WASHING 
TON AT TUSKEGEE. 



10 



ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 



and two dormitor}- rooms. Formerly 
the first floor had been two stories 
high, fully twenty-five feet from floor 
to rafters. The little house in which 
the school began is now used for girls" 
dormitory and dining-room. In this 
department the mother of the prin- 
cipal is his able assistant. Adjacent 
to the little house, and back of the 
school building is a garden, and in 
the agricultural department the father 
gives his services. In the large build- 
ing are also sleeping rooms for the 
boys, for there are one hundred stu- 
dents enrolled, twenty-six of whom 
are boarders. In front of the school 
are scattered a few spreading pines 
which shade a stretch of green grass 
cropped close by the cows and mules. 
At the time of my visit, under these 
trees were arranged rough board 
tables, and on them spread a simple 
feast for parents and friends who had 
come many miles by cart and mule 
to see the -graduation." While I 
was there several members of the 
School Board, among them the Editor 
of the County Paper, came out to visit the 
school. They spoke words of hearty praise 
for the principal and his work. IMost honor. 
however, is really due to the farmer and 





HAINES INSTITUTE, AUGUSTA, GA. 



PRINCIPAL AND TEACHERS OF HAINES INSTITUTE, AU- 
GUSTA, GA. THE FOUNDER AND PRINCIPAL (IN THE 
FOREGROUND WITH HANDS BEHIND) IS A GRADUATE OF 
1873, AND SIX OF HER ASSISTANTS ARE ALSO ATLANTA 
GR-ADUATES. 



his wife who sent their sons to the place 
Avhere they believed they could get the 
best education, and did so at the cost of 
peculiar sacrifice. 

A visit to Tuskegee Institute is 
always most agreeable to one who 
is associated wit^ Atlanta Univer- 
sity, not only because of the interest 
that attracts ever}^ one to that mag- 
nificent industrial work, and not 
only because of the cordiality of 
Mr. Washington, but also because 
the Atlanta University graduates 
working there are always ready to 
greet old friends and make them 
feel at home. The Chaplain, who 
is also Dean of the Bible School, 
and his wife and the wife of the 
Treasurer and several of the other 
workers are Atlanta graduates, put- 
ting into practice at Tuskegee the 



GRADUATES' WORK 



11 




MANUAL TRAINING AT HAINES INSTITUTE, IN CHARGE OF AN ATLANTA 
GRADUATE OF I90I. 

training they have received at Atlanta Uni- 
versity. 

Time would fail me to tell of the Haines 
Institute in Augusta, Ga., one of the schools 
of the Freedmen's Board of the Presbyterian 
Church, the founder and principal of which 
with six of her assistants are graduates of 
Atlanta University ; or of the Lamson 
School in Marshallville, Ga., one of the A. 
M. A. Schools, the founder and principal of 
which with three of her assistants are grad- 
uates of Atlanta University. There are one 
hundred and twenty-five boys and girls at 
the Lamson School now, and there will be 
more when cotton-picking season is over, 
for most of the pupils come from 
the cotton fields and corn fields of 
Georgia, and there first learn the 
most rudimentary principles of liv- 
ing. Nor can I tell much of the 
Reed Orphan Home in Covington, 
born of the sympathetic heart of 
one of the Atlanta graduates who 
went there to teach, and adopted a 
motherless little child because there 
was no one else to care for her. 
And today this good woman tells 
me that she can come to Atlanta 
for a short visit without anxiety 



because she leaves the 
orphans in charge of 
that little waif, now 
grown, on whose ac- 
count her work of 
mercy was begun. 

In each of the South- 
ern States there is an 
institution for agricul- 
tural and mechanical 
instruction of Negroes, 
sometimes with normal 
and collegiate depart- 
ments, maintained by 
the State government, 
largely, if not w^holly, 
with money received 
from the United States 
treasury under what are 
known as the " Land Grant " and the " Mor- 
rill " acts. These schools naturally require 
teachers of high grade, fitted not only to 
instruct but to organize and manage. It is 
a significant fact that Atlanta University 
has furnished teachers to no less than eight 
of these institutions and to two of them 
their presidents. The Georgia State In- 
dustrial College for Colored Youth near 
Savannah was originally organized in 1890 
under an x'Vtlanta University graduate of the 
class of 1876, who has remained at its head 
to the present time, and a considerable por- 
tion of his Faculty has usually been drawn 
from fellow-graduates of his Alma Mater. 




REED ORPHAN HOME, COVINGTON, GA., WHOSE FOUNDER 
AND HOUSE-MOTHER IS A GRADUATE OF l88^. 



12 



ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 



At Lincoln Institute, Jefferson City, Mis- 
souri, which is the Land Grant colored in- 
stitution for that State, the recently ap- 
pointed president is an Atlanta graduate of 
the class of 1894, who for seven years had 
been one of its professors, much of that 
time, also, its vice-president. 

In another of these State institutions, 
that at Prairie View, Texas, two of the old- 
est members of the Faculty came from At- 
lanta University, one of them a graduate of 
1883, now in his thirteenth year of service 
there, and the other a non-graduate who 
had taken only a partial course at Atlanta, 
but who had proved so capable in his me- 
chanical work that he was called upon for 
several years to serve as assistant instructor 
in the shop. At Prairie View he has su- 
perintended the construction of several of 
the school buildings and been intrusted 
Avith the installing of thousands of dollars' 
worth of expensive machinery and other 
mechanical outfit. 

Scattered all over the South are numer- 



ous missionary schools for Negroes, often 
of secondary and even higher grade, sup- 
ported mainly by the churches of the dif- 
ferent denominations both at the North and 
the South. To very many of these institu- 
tions, Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian, Con- 
gregational, and Episcopalian, Atlanta Uni- 
versity has furnished teachers for both aca- 
demic and industrial work, and to a consid- 
erable number of them their principals or 
presidents. In one of these institutions, 
Clark University at South Atlanta, Ga., an 
Atlanta University graduate of the class of 
1876 has held the chair of Classics for 
twenty-six years, and is almost, if not quite, 
the oldest member of the Faculty in time 
of service. He is a speaker of marked 
power, has delivered many public addresses 
in the interest of his race, and written much 
for the press, exerting a wide and whole- 
some influence. 

In quite a number of these missionary 
schools the heads of the industrial depart- 
ments or the instructors in them are gradu- 




BOYS DORMITORY AND STUDENTS OF GEORGIA STATE INDUSTRIAL COLLEGE, NEAR SAVANNAH, GA. 
WHOSE FIRST AND ONLY PRESIDEI^T IS AN ATLANTA GRADUATE OF 1876. 



GRADUATES' WORK 



13 




OFFICK AND LIBRARY OF PRESIDENT OF GEORGIA STATE INDUSTRIAL COLLEGE. 



ates of Atlanta University. The Superin- 
tendent of the Industrial Department of 
Biddle University at Charlotte, N. C, the 
large institution maintained by the Northern 
Presbyterian Church, has for the past 
eleven years been an Atlanta graduate of 
the class of i8go, and one or more of the 
buildings of that institution have been 
erected by its students under his super- 
vision. 

The position of teacher is the vantage 
ground from which most of the Atlanta 
graduates reach out to help their fellows 
up to better things, and yet occasionally 
teaching opens the way for service that is 
still more far-reaching. This was the case 
with one of the Atlanta graduates who seven- 
teen years ago went to Texas as a public 
school teacher. When he traveled about 
in that State, he could not fail to observe 
the squalid condition of the Negro homes. 
He chanced one day to read an account of 
a certain village improvement society in 
New England. With reference to this he 
says, " I thought if the people of New Eng- 



land needed such an organization, if with all 
their wealth and culture and taste they had 
found it advantageous to associate them- 
selves together for the betterment of their 
environment, how much more ought the 
Negro, recently emancipated, without a 
beautiful home, and with the worst kind 
of environment, to take up work on these 
lines." This was the beginning of the 
Farmers' Improvement Society of Texas — 
first a doubtful experiment, after five years 
of persistent endeavor a well established 
society in Oakland, and now an organiza- 
tion with over a hundred branches scat- 
tered over the State of Texas, with about 
three thousand members who have bought 
and largely paid for fifty thousand acres of 
land, which with their other possessions 
will bring their wealth up to three quarters 
of a million dollars. Before an applicant 
is allowed to pay his initiation fee and be 
enrolled as a member, he is required by the 
constitution of the society to answer cer- 
tain questions in the affirmative, of which I 
quote the following: 



14 



ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 



" Will you promise to do all in your 
power to emancipate yourself from the 
credit system ? " 

" Will you endeavor to economize and 
plan so that your efforts thus made will be 
a success ? " 

" Will you faithfully try to become a 
better worker, and if you are a farmer, will 
you make every effort to improve your 
methods of agriculture ? " 

" Do you hereby solemnly promise to 
improve your home and make life pleasant 
and agreeable for your family as far as you 
are able ? " 

The founder of this society is a man of 



The Farmers' Improvement Society 
holds an annual " convocation " and fair. 
Last October it was held at Columbus, 
Texas. The group of women in the pic- 
ture on page sixteen calls to mind a branch 
of the society which makes eligible the 
" better half " in looking more carefully 
after the pigs, chickens, eggs, butter and 
other small products of the farm. It en- 
joys the suggestive title of : 

"THE WOMAN'S BARNYARD AUXILIARY OF THE 
FARMERS' IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY OF TEXAS." 

Not many of the Atlanta graduates have 
gone into business, and yet those who have 
are making a marked success of it. One 





LINCOLN INSTITUTE, JEFFERSON CITY, MO., WHOSE 

much native ability and of undaunted per- 
severance. He attributes his success, how- 
ever, largely to the mental training and dis- 
cipline which he received at Atlanta Uni- 
versity. His ability and usefulness have 
been so far recognized by the people of his 
State that he has twice been elected to the 
Texas Legislature, and that by the aid of 
votes of Southern white men in a predomi- 
nantly white community. Quite recently he 
has been appointed to an important and 
lucrative Federal office in Texas by Presi- 
dent Roosevelt, whose attention was first 
drawn to him by an article of his in the 
N. Y. Outlook, describing the work of the 
Farmers' Improvement Society. 



PRESIDENT IS AN ATLANTA GRADUATE OF IO94. 

young man is a prosperous grocer in the 
city of Atlanta. He read a paper at the 
Conference of the Colored Men's Business 
League of America in Chicago a few years 
ago, in which he emphasized the impor- 
tance of a thorough education for success 
in business. 

Last April while in Charleston, S. C, 
walking down King Street, an important 
business street of that city, my attention 
was arrested by an unusually neat and 
attractive shoe store. What was my sur- 
prise and pleasure upon stopping to find in 
charge of the store two Atlanta graduates 
of the college class of 1899. These two 
classmates went into that business about 



GRADUATES' WORK 



15 




PROFESSORS HOUSE AT BIDDLK UNIVERSITY, CHARLOTTE, 
N. C, IN PROCESS OF ERECTION BY STUDENTS OF THAT 
INSTITUTION, UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THEIR SUPERIN- 
TENDENT OF INDUSTRIAL WORK, AN ATLANTA GRADUATE 
OF 1890. 



two years ago, and have been very success- 
ful. They tell me that they have customers 
among people of both races. 

The four Atlanta graduates who have 
studied medicine are doing remarkably 
well. All of them were among the first 
in their classes in the medical schools 
which they attended. Two have been ap- 
pointed city physicians for the Negroes in 
Denver, Colo., and in Savannah, Ga., re- 
spectively. The one who is located in 



Atlanta has neat and attractive 
rooms on Peachtree Street, 
where I called upon him re- 
cently. He says that there is 
a great opportunity for colored 
physicians, and great need for 
them to work among their peo- 
ple. The ignorance of great 
numbers of the Negroes with 
reference to the simplest and 
most rudimentary principles of 
hygiene is deplorable. Here is 
opportunity for a noble work 
for medical missionaries at 
home ; and who can minister 
more sympathetically or help- 
fully to the needs of the Negroes 
than carefully trained physicians from their 
own number ? 

Only two graduates of Atlanta Univer- 
sity are practicing law as a means of liveli- 
hood, though several others have studied 
law and been admitted to the bar. One of 
the two referred to, a graduate of 1881, has 
for nearly twenty years had a successful 
practice in Boston, not only among the nu- 
merous Negroes of that city and Cambridge, 
but among the Chinese, Italians, and white 




SHOP FOR FORGE-WORK AT PRAIRIE VIEW STATK NORMAL SCHOOL, TEXAS, IN 
PROCESS OF ERECTION BY STUDENTS OF THAT INSTITUTION, UNDER THE 
DIRECTION OF THEIR SUPERINTENDENT OF INDUSTRIAL WORK, A FORMER 
COLLEGE STUDENT AND TEACHER IN THE INDUSTRIAL DEPARTMENT OF AT- 
LANTA UNIVERSITY. 



16 



ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 




CONVOCATION AND FAIR OF THE FARMERS' IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY OF TEXAS, FOUNDED BY A GRAD- 
UATE OF 1880. 



Americans as well. Drawing his clients in 
good proportion from the races of four con- 
tinents, he is perhaps the most cosmopoli- 
tan lawyer in his city. A few years ago he 
was honored with an appointment as Master- 
in-Chancery by the late lamented Governor 
Wolcott of Massachusetts. The other prac- 



ticing lawyer, an Atlanta graduate of 1893, 
is also succeeding well in his profession at 
Augusta, Ga., and not long ago won a case 
before the Supreme Court of Georgia against 
white lawyers, which he had appealed from 
a lower court. 

After all, the real test of education is to 




np^nrwrsrsp 



EXHIBIT OF FARM PRODUCTS AT FAIR OF FARMERS' IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY OF 

TEXAS. 



GRADUATES' WORK 



17 



be found in the home Ufe of the people. 
Your minister may be eloquent, your doc- 
tor skilled, and your teacher efficient, yet 
if they have not the spirit of integrity and 
gentleness and forbearance and service in 
the home, their education is defective. 
Wisdom without righteousness is folly, and 
people do well to emphasize the moral 
education of the Negroes. We believe that 
the most effective channel by which to in- 
stil the qualities of Christian character into 
the hearts of people is that of personal 
association. In the contact of living souls 
is found the supreme quality of education. 
Much is made, therefore, of the home life 
at Atlanta University, where the students 
coming jnto daily association with the 
teachers may learn by the influence of 
example. Eveiy student, even though he 
has been a day pupil, must spend at least 
one year in the school family before gradu- 
ating. It certainly has been encouraging 
for me, as I have been about in the South, 
to visit the schools and homes of our 
graduates, to see that they have not for- 
gotten the good manners and Christian 
customs learned at the Atlanta University. 
In the home life of people rests the ruin 
or welfare of the race. Upon this point 
one of the normal graduates writes thus : 




SHOE STORE IN CHARLESTON, S C, CONDUCTED BY 
TWO COLLEGE GRADUATES OF 1 899. 

" Not only have our graduates estab- 
lished homes in the cities but many of 
them have chosen to locate in the smaller 
towns and country places, where the ex- 
ample or object lesson of good homes and 




OFFICE OF CITY PHYSICIAN FOR NEGROES, DENVER, COLO., AN ATLANTA 
GRADUATE OF 1881. 



18 



ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 





HOME IN DECATUR, GA., OF A GRADUATE OF 1885 (RECENTLY DE- 
CEASED), AND HIS WIFE, A GRADUATE OF 1886. 



Christian character is in a sense more 
needed. One of our normal graduates 
went to a town where there was but one 
house occupied by Negroes that had more 
than one room. The first thing she did 
after marrying was to build a five-room 
cottage. This little cottage was an inspira- 
tion to others in the community. They 




began to feel that, with some effort and econ- 
omy on their part, they too might improve 
the condition of their own homes. To- 
day, through the influence of this one life, 
the people have been encouraged to im- 
prove the conditions of their surroundings 
by making additions to the one-room cabins 
or building new ones. They own their own 
homes, and there are few 
one-room cabins in the com- 
munity. This question of 
good homes means much for 
the people. It means better 
morals, less sickness, stronger 
children and fewer deaths. 
How necessary is it then 
that we appreciate more 
highly the work done by our 
old students in this direc- 
tion ! The hope of the race 
must be the foundation of 
pure homes, built from the 
high ideals that so many of 
' our graduates have shown 
in planting theirs. We are 
striving to make our homes 
our castles in the true sense 
of the word — not by fortifi- 
cations against the mortal 



HOME IN SAVANNAH, GA., OF A GRADUATE OF 1S79. 



GRADUATES' WORK 



21 



Summary of Atlanta University Graduates 
and their Occupations 



The following table is taken from the annual statement in the catalogue 
of 1902, but does not include the graduates of that year. Including these, the 
total number of graduates is now 429. 





♦College. 


Normal. 


tToTAL. 




Number. 


Per Cent. 


Number. 


Per Cent. 


Number. 


Per Cent. 


TOTAL 


104 
88 
16 
91 
13 
91 
76 
15 

56 

10 

9 

5 
4 
2 
1 
1 

1 

2 


100.0 
84.6 
15.4 

87.5 
12.5 
100.0 
83.5 
16.5 

61.5 
11.0 
9.9 
5 5 
4.4 
2.2 
LI 
1.1 

1.1 

2.2 


310 
14 

296 
275 
35 
275 
8 
267 

163 
3 

1 

5 

93 
10 


100.0 
4.5 

95.5 
88.7 
11.3 
100.0 
2.9 
97.1 

59.3 
1.1 

0.4 

1.8 

33.8 
3.6 


t412 

102 

t310 

1364 

48 
1364 

84 
1280 

+217 
13 

6 

6 

94 
12 


100.0 


Male 


24.8 




75.2 




88.3 


Dead 


11.7 


LIVING 


100.0 


Male 


23.1 




76.9 


OCCUPATIONS. 


59.6 




3.6 








1.7 










13entist 






1.7 


Married Women not otherwise des- 


25.8 


Undesignated 


3.3 



* Including three graduates from a theological course, 
t Two students graduated in two departments. 



22 STATEMENT OF THE VORK 




boys' dormitory. stone hall. gikls dormitory. 

THE WORK OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 

( Thirty-fourth year) 



Teacher Training 

The principal work of Atlanta Univei'sity is the training of teachers for 
the Negfo pnblic schools, especially in the cities and larger towns wJiere graded 
schools, crowded with hundreds of cJiild7'en, call for teacJiers and principals with 
ability to organise, discipline, and teach in the most effective manner. One and 
a half million Negroes {one sixth of their entire niimber) live in the cities. 

Industrial Teachers 

In its departments of Mechanic Arts and Domestic Science, young men and 
women are trained for positions as industrial teacJiers in private, industrial and 
missionary schools and the State industrial colleges. The University is already 
prepared to supply teachers of industry in the public common schools as soon as 
such instruction is provided for. 

Sociological Work 

The University makes a specialty of the careful, scientific investigation of 
the social, edticational, economic, and m.oral conditions of the Negro population, 
for the double purpose of supplying accurate information to students of social 
problems everywhere, and especially, for aiding and stimjilating its graduates in 
efforts for social betterment. This zvork of Atlanta University has been highly 
commended by the London Spectator and the Southern History Association. 

M f> - 3 8» Curriculum 

A college course of four years, preceded by a three years^ preparatory coui'se, 
a normal course of fojir years, and an English high school course of three years, 
make up the cui'riciUum. The completion of a grammar school training is re- 
qtdred for admission into the lozvest classes. Industrial training is an integral 
part of the various courses. Provision is also made for post-graduate study. 

LfffG. 



OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 



23 



Unsectanan Position 

Earnestly Christian, as required by its charter, yet entirely mtsectarian, the 
institution is controlled solely by its ozun board of trustees, on which several 
denominations are represented. Earnest efforts are made to imbue the students 
with a missionary spirit, leading them to use their superior education in the 
service of the masses of their race. 

Enrollment 

About JOO students are enrolled,, some 50 of them in the college course, 
under 2^ teachers and officers. From the college and normal courses, 42g grad- 
uates have been sent out, nearly all of ivhom have readily found permanent em- 
ployment in teaching or other useful occupations. 

The Plant 

Five large brick buildings on a campus of sixty-five acres, an endoivcd library 
of over 11,000 volumes, physical, chemical, and sociological laboratories zvith groiv- 
ing equipment, and a large, well furnished printing office constitute the chief 

features of the material plant, ivhich 
is ivorth not less than $2^0,000. 




KNUWLES INDUSTRIAL BUILDING. 



Permanent Funds 

/;/ round numbers, these are as 
follows : 

For scholarships .... $30,000 

For general endowment . 12,000 

For maintenance of library, 6,000 

Total $48,000 



Needs 

The great need of the University is an endozvment of at least $^00,000. 
The pressing need is money for current expenses. The total annual cost of the 
zvork is about $^0,000. Of this the students themselves pay in cash about 
$10,000, and the invested funds and a feiv miscellaneous revenues yield an in- 
come of about $S,000. For the remaining $J^,000, the University is dependent 
upon the annual gifts of its friends. 

Legacies for endozvment or current 
expenses should be made payable to ^'The 
Trustees of the Atlanta University'' 
in Atlanta, Ga., and attested by three 
tvitnesses. 

Remittances of any amount may 
be addressed to 



Horace BumSTEAD, President, or I 

Myron IV. Adams, Treasure?-, 

DOMESTIC SCIENCE BUILDINCi 

Atlanta University, Atlanta, Ga. 




PRESIDENT CHARLES W. ELIOT, 
OF HARVARD UNIVERSITY, IN 
REFERRING TO THE WORK OF 
ATLANTA UNIVERSITY, HAS SAID: 
"BUT THERE IS ANOTHER ESSEN- 
TIAL THING — NAMELY, THAT THE 
TEACHERS, PREACHERS, PHYSI- 
CIANS, LAWYERS, ENGINEERS, AND 
SUPERIOR MECHANICS, THE LEAD- 
ERS OF INDUSTRY, THROUGHOUT 
THE NEGRO COMMUNITIES OF THE 
SOUTH, SHOULD BE TRAINED IN 
SUPERIOR INSTITUTIONS. IF ANY 
EXPECT THAT THE NEGRO TEACH- 
ERS OF THE SOUTH CAN BE ADE- 
QUATELY EDUCATED IN PRIMARY 
SCHOOLS, OR GRAMMAR SCHOOLS, 
OR INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS PURE 
AND SIMPLE, I CAN ONLY SAY IN 
REPLY THAT THAT IS MORE THAN 
WE CAN DO AT THE NORTH WITH 
THE WHITE RACE. THE ONLY WAY 
TO HAVE GOOD PRIMARY SCHOOLS 
AND GRAMMAR SCHOOLS IN MASSA- 
CHUSETTS IS TO HAVE HIGH AND 
NORMAL SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES, 
IN WHICH THE HIGHER TEACHERS 
ARE TRAINED. IT MUST BE SO 
THROUGHOUT THE SOUTH ; THE 
NEGRO RACE NEEDS ABSOLUTELY 
THESE HIGHER FACILITIES OF 
EDUCATION." /s>^ jsf jsf £>- JEf £>^ 



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